Our Favorite Archetypal Landscape - Denis Dutton, TED

 Denis Dutton  is a philosopher... He is the head of the Department of Philosophy at the University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand.

Dutton is from Los Angeles, California and was educated at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He taught at several US universities before emigrating to New Zealand (like my dear friend, Louisa, did...)

 In his book The Art Instinct, Dutton suggests that humans are hard-wired to seek beauty.  He gave a talk at TED on THE DARWINIAN THEORY OF BEAUTY and referred to the Atavistic Archetypes of Beauty....Here is an excerpt from his talk where Dutton describes the archetypal landscape that we all seem to prefer over any other:

“Consider briefly... the magnetic pull of beautiful landscapes.

People in very different cultures all over the world tend to like a particular kind of landscape, a landscape that just happens to be similar to the Pleistocene savannas where we evolved.

Savanna, Uganda - Ruwenzori Mountains

This landscape shows up today on calendars, on postcards, in the design of golf courses and public parks and in gold-framed pictures that hang in living rooms from New York to New Zealand.

It's a kind of Hudson River school landscape (I love this - I live in the Hudson River Valley)  featuring open spaces of low grasses interspersed with copses of trees.

Oak Savanna

The trees, by the way, are often preferred if they fork near the ground, that is to say, if they're trees you could scramble up if you were in a tight fix.

The landscape shows the presence of water directly in view, or evidence of water in a bluish distance, indications of animal or bird life as well as diverse greenery

forest near Killarney, Ireland

and finally -- get this -- a path or a road, perhaps a riverbank or a shoreline, that extends into the distance, almost inviting you to follow it.

Kenyan Highlands - North of Nanyuki

This landscape type is regarded as beautiful, even by people in countries that don't have it.

San Francisco Park

The ideal savanna landscape is one of the clearest examples where human beings everywhere find beauty in similar visual experience.”

Rift Valley, Kenya near Kaptagat

Here is a wonderful animated version of his talk. Its a little long...but a lot of fun with the animated graphics: